Dirge of the 14th
by C.B. Magique
Summary: Allen Walker had never thought anything of his birth parents who had abandoned him but when he saves the soul of an akuma who knows the name of his birth mother he believes that it is finally time for him to get some real closure.
1. Prologue

Gosh, my first DGM fanfic! I'm just stating to get that out there, that and I'm reflecting on the fact that everytime I write another fanfic you can almost guarantee that it will be in a different category from the one I wrote last time... unless it's Kingdom Hearts. I write a hell of a lot of that.

But, in any case, first DGM. I think I am not completely, totally, fully up-to-date with the latest couple of chapters since I am currently in the process of moving interstate about 3000km and I'm lazy. This story is supposed to slot somewhere into the canon and essentially be non-consequential. As always, I'm slightly anxious about the reader response because I'm writing in a totally new category (again) but I hope that this at least amuses people. let me know what you think of this prologue and I'll see what I can do about getting the rest of it up in a timely manner (I'm not good at uploading in a timely manner, you see).

**Okay, so, Disclaimer:** I don't own DGM. I wrote this in my hobby time (and sometimes in my homework time) because I got bored and started using my imagination.

* * *

**Prologue**

Allen leaped to avoid a flurry of acid spit projected from a Level III akuma's wide, gaping mouth. It was already excited. All of its eyes swivelled on its helmet to search out his agile form and keep an eye on him. Allen summoned his exorcising sword from his left arm. The akuma reached for him. He activated his Clown Belt to hold it down and sliced off one of its arms. It shrieked in indignation.

"My arm! Curse you, Allen Walker!"

Allen paid no mind to its infuriated screaming. It was a machine; its arm could be replaced but Allen could not allow it to live for that long. It tried to slap him into the ground – this one was particularly large. Allen rolled out of the way and cut half of its arm off at the elbow. It screamed at him again, swiping at him with the bleeding stump. The Exorcist jumped onto the remaining half of its arm to avoid the blood splatters and ran up to its shoulder. He leapt into the air when it turned its giant jaws towards him either to bite or spit more acid. Allen adjusted the weight of the sword in his hand. The akuma lifted its head and hissed at him, preparing to shoot more acid. It only managed a meagre fountain before Allen cut through its entire body. The two halves split neatly and folded away limply like paper. It began to crumble. The soul trapped in the dark mist emerged, shedding its chains with a smile. Allen smiled back.

This soul like all others held the appearance of its owner when seen through Allen's left eye. It was a blue-eyed woman wearing a white blouse and a rose pink, knee-length skirt with long chestnut-coloured hair that curled delightfully and bounced in the breeze. She would have been so beautiful if it weren't for the reptilian scales stretching across her skin and spreading like a disease. Spiky spines were growing along her shins and the outside of her forearms and also along the shell of her ear, giving her an elfin-eared appearance.

"Allen Walker," she whispered, reaching out to him. She was already being drawn away to her judgment before God. Her outstretched hand kept her anchored to the world for a few seconds longer to deliver her final message. "Your mother's name was Jennifer Morrow."

She disappeared to meet her fate, leaving Allen in shock. A spark of mixed emotions snapped through his heart. For all these years Allen had held nothing for his mother or father; the people who had abandoned him as a baby for nothing but the cosmetic ugliness of his left arm. However, hearing his mother's name made his heart skip a beat and something like hope was growing inside him. He didn't know if it was true or if he could believe the woman's soul but with his mother's name a window of opportunity to research was opening before him. He could find out who she is, where she is, and maybe even meet her!

"Allen Walker!" Link snapped, breaking Allen out of his reverie. "You've destroyed the akuma and the innocence is secured. We need to get rid of this homeless bum and return to headquarters."

Allen turned to him and cocked his head to the side. Link was standing before him trying to maintain his composed facial appearance while struggling in a tug-of-war with golden goblet against an old, crippled man dressed in rags. Timcanpy hovered above them merely watching despite its opportunity to intervene at any time.

"You can't take that from me!" the man yelled. "That's how I survive!"

That goblet was what they'd been searching for. The old man – they hadn't yet gotten his name – had been using it to tell fortunes and make an income since apparently whenever he poured something into it the drinker could see a brief but vague vision of the future. Some even alleged that the goblet gave them a holy experience, like a glimpse at heaven or hell and other such things. It might make a great addition to the Order's collection, but it didn't look like the tug-of-war was ending any time soon. Allen sighed, thinking of the only way he could get this to stop.

"You know, Link, maybe we should just take the old man with us. Did it ever occur to you that he could be the one who's compatible with it?" Allen asked.

Link paused. It seemed that thought hadn't crossed the other's mind. The homeless man looked confused.

"Eh? Compatible? What're you going on about? That cup makes me money and that's all I care about. I'm not letting you run off with it!"

"Let's put it this way," Allen said with a sigh, "Just accept that you're compatible and come with us to the Black Order. We work for the Vatican so anything worth money is covered by the Church."

"Are you serious?" the man gasped.

"Absolutely," Allen replied. "The Order gives you everything you need. How about it?"

The man grumbled, still looking sceptical about this too-good-to-be-true offer. Finally he snorted. "Fine, but only if I get to keep my cup."


	2. The Saint

**The Saint**

The Science Department's offices were in chaos again when Allen entered to give his mission report. He tread uncaringly upon the carpet of documents that had fallen haphazardly to the floor, some of them probably still needing Komui's signature. He had brought the old beggar with him and Link followed diligently as usual. Timcanpy had now also taken up a comfortable position in the crook of his neck. Procedure dictated that mission reports had to be handed in directly to the supervisor... and as usual Komui was avoiding his work. Allen sighed. He'd thought that by meeting Komui directly after his mission he would be able to talk about some investigative research regarding Jennifer Morrow but that would have to wait. Instead, Allen decided to spite the supervisor by dumping his report randomly within the mountain of miscellaneous papers on the desk.

"Oh, Allen, you're back," Reever stated, opening a can of soft drink. "Welcome back. And... who's the old man?"

"Good evening Reever," Allen said, politely as always. "This man's name is Michael. We found him carrying the object we suspected was the innocence. I think it's possible that he's also the compatible user of the innocence."

"We can have Hevlaska check that out. In the meantime you should get some rest. You look stressed."

Allen chuckled nervously. "Uh, I do? Well, maybe. I guess Komui isn't around at all, is he? Do you know where he is?"

"I was just about to go and find out," Reever answered, gripping his drink can harder than necessary. "Why are you so eager to see him? Did you break your innocence?"

"No, no, nothing like that!" Allen exclaimed, paling at the thought of having Komui fix his innocence. "I just need to know something... do you know if there's any way for someone like me to access information about a particular person from the Order's records?"

"Sure," Reever said, taking a sip of his drink. "Do you know anything about this particular person? A full name would be most helpful."

"I was hoping it would be, since that's all I have. I want to find out about a woman named Jennifer Morrow."

Reever's eyebrows rose.

"Jennifer Morrow!" Link gasped. "You've worked within the Black Order for a substantial amount of time and yet you know nothing about Jennifer Morrow?"

Allen blinked. "Is she important?"

"Important? She became a saint."

"R-really?" Allen asked. He felt Timcanpy shift on his shoulder and petted it with a finger. "So that must mean that you can tell me a lot about her, right?"

"We have lots of information about her, yes," Reever confirmed. "But why do you want to know about her? Did something happen in the mission?"

"Um... I just heard an akuma saying her name, that's all. I just got curious as to who she was."

Link harrumphed. "I highly doubt that. If you were merely curious the knowledge that she was a saint and a highly revered one would have satisfied you already. I'm guessing the akuma disclosed some other information about her."

"N-no! That's really all it said," Allen defended, waving his hands in front of him as if that would ward off Link's accusatory glare.

"You know, for five dollars I'll let you drink out of the cup and maybe God will give you a vision about her," Michael supplied unhelpfully.

"Don't be stupid," Allen said. "I don't think that this is a situation where God's going to be a lot of help."

"Just go and check in the library," Reever suggested. "It'll be easy to find some material with some details about her."

"Okay, I will. Thank-you," Allen replied. He left the offices quickly, leaving Michael behind. He glanced backwards every now again only to groan when he saw Link writing what he supposed were more suspicions about him in that notebook.

xxxxxxxx

Allen looked around the library at the expanse of books available and with the librarian having gone on his lunchbreak a few minutes ago there was no way of him knowing where to start. The layout was starkly different to that of the original library in the old HQ and Allen was very bad at mental mapping. He turned to Link who was giving him a blank look. Allen assumed that meant he didn't know his way around the library either. He sighed, trying to assess the logic of checking every book for a reference, when he felt a tug on his hair. He looked up. Timcanpy was pulling gently with quick, short tugs.

"Tim, is there something wrong?" Allen asked. "If you want food I don't have any. It's not dinnertime yet."

Timcanpy let go of his hair and fluttered around in bizarre circles (it might have been some form of frustration) before flying away in an unfamiliar direction. Allen gasped and took off after it. The golem darted around some shelves and corners that Allen with his poor directional sense couldn't hope to remember. It stopped in a study area that was crammed with towers of books as tall as Allen, some even taller, and in the middle of it Lavi was reclined in a simple wooden chair with his feet propped up on a stack of books. He was fast asleep with his headband pulled down over his eyes like a sleeping mask. It hit Allen like an epiphany. Lavi must have read through most of the library by now and he was the man who remembered everything. He was the perfect starting point of the investigation.

Allen waded through messy piles of books to reach the Bookman apprentice while Link wrinkled his nose in disgust at fallen stacks that hadn't been righted and began to clean up after Lavi. Allen put a hand on Lavi's shoulder to shake him. Lavi mumbled something in his sleep but didn't show any signs of waking.

"Lavi... Lavi wake up I need to talk to you," Allen whispered. Lavi snored a bit and shifted his position, shrugging off Allen's hand. "Lavi..."

"If I might point out, Walker," Link interrupted, stacking pile of books neatly, "whispering and light nudging aren't going to have much effect."

Allen scowled at him. "What am I supposed to do? We're in a _library_."

As Allen and Link tried in vain to concoct a solution that would both wake Lavi and obey the rules of the library Timcanpy slipped behind the chair and opened its mouth to bare its teeth. It took aim and sunk its fangs into Lavi's left buttock.

"HOLY MOTHER OF SWEET FUCK!" Lavi screamed reaching back instinctively and tearing the little yellow golem off his butt.

"Keep it down Lavi, you're in a library," Allen shushed. Lavi glared at him menacingly, still holding the offensive golem by the tail. "Oh... you're awake. That's great! Lavi I really need to talk to you."

"So you sic your golem on me?" Lavi retorted, fixing his headband. "Do you have any idea how many favours you would need to do for me to make up for this?"

"This wouldn't have occurred," Link pointed out, "if you'd been doing your job as Bookman apprentice rather than napping."

"Hey, you don't know what being Bookman Junior is like!" Lavi argued. "I have to take advantage of any moment when the Old Panda leaves otherwise I'd end up looking like him and the ladies don't like their guys wrinkled and baggy-eyed."

"Lavi, pay attention!" Allen exclaimed, grabbing Lavi's head and forcing him to look the younger exorcist in the eye. "The information I need from you is far more important than that. I need you to tell me anything you know about Jennifer Morrow."

Link scratched down a few more notes for his report.

"Huh? Just her?" Lavi asked, not really seeing how this research was in any way fruitful or meaningful. "Well, she's a saint from England but not a patron and her symbology consists of stigmata, snow or snowflakes and sometimes a baby too."

"That stuff's not important," Allen snapped in his eagerness. His eyes twitched when he heard Link writing down more notes. "Saints were people before they ascended into heaven, right? So do you know anything about her life before she died?"

Lavi blinked. "Why do you want to know this?"

"Please just tell me."

"Okay... well, during her lifetime she was just an ordinary human – I believe she did work as a teacher of small children – and her maiden name was Jennifer Stone before she married Adrian Morrow; a doctor with a private clinic. Her sainthood is mainly attributed to the fact that complete stigmata appeared on her body the minute she conceived her first child."

"Complete stigmata?" Allen queried.

"Yeah, you know that stigmata is when someone receives the wounds of Jesus as he died on the cross and it's a highly regarded holy mark," Lavi explained. "Those wounds that Lenalee received when her innocence became crystal type are stigmata but it's only partial. Even the Noah don't have the full stigmata on their bodies. Jennifer Morrow's medical records report that she had wounds around her head like a crown, holes in her wrists and feet, cuts across her back and a stab wound in her left side. Those are all of Jesus' wounds according to the Fourteen Stations. For Jennifer Morrow, the wounds never showed any sign of healing or clotting even after she gave birth to her child but after that things start to look strange."

"Strange? How so?"

Even Link's interest was piqued and he stopped writing notes to listen with his full attention.

"Well," Lavi continued, "It can be confirmed without question that she did give birth at midnight on Christmas Eve but aside from that I can't find any other evidence that the baby existed, not even a birth certificate. It could be that the baby was stillborn and was never christened but even so, the appropriate paperwork would still have to be filled out. I also know that she gave birth in her husband's country house with just him and the midwife to deliver the child. That would mean that Adrian Morrow became responsible for completing the appropriate paperwork including the birth certificate. It's possible that for some reason Adrian Morrow failed to do so on purpose – which could have been due to severe crippling or other deformities which might've embarrassed him – but either way, Jennifer Morrow disappeared later that morning and was found again three days later in some woods. She was already dead and not only was her baby missing, her clothes were missing too so she was wearing nothing but her underwear..."

Lavi paused and his eye turned to the ceiling for some reason. A silly smile started to twitch its way onto his face. Allen shook him violently.

"And?"

"H-hey, cut it out! That's pretty much it," Lavi admitted. "The only other thing I can tell you is that the widely accepted theory as to how she lost her clothes is that some poor homeless person or wanderer happened across her in the woods and stole the clothes to keep themselves warm for the rest of the winter. Also, if you were to ask anyone, even me, about why she is so highly revered as a saint they probably couldn't tell you any reason other than the fact that she received full stigmata for some reason."

"I've never heard of this conspiracy before," Link finally piped up, half amazed and half incredulous.

"Well, what do you think was the reason?" Allen asked Lavi.

"Given the history of her endowment with the holy mark," Lavi answered, "I think that maybe she wasn't the holy one but her child was. More radical historians and theologians have suggested that she could have been the new mother of God. But we can't confirm that without knowing the identity of her child and what exactly happened to it."

Allen let go of Lavi's head and sighed. The more he thought about it the more plausible it all seemed but the huge gap in the story cast a storm of doubt over his thoughts.

"Why do you look so depressed?" Lavi ventured to ask. "I just told you what you wanted to know, right?"

"Yes, Lavi. Thank-you," Allen replied. "There are just some things that I have to sort out."

Allen turned on his heel and left the library, requiring a bit of guidance from Link to make all of the correct turns. The inspector sighed exasperatedly when they reached the library's exit, feeling more like he was babysitting a toddler than keeping close tabs on dangerous suspect. In the corridor as Allen trudged to his favourite place to be – the cafeteria – Link caught wind of a quiet, under-his-breath comment from the white-haired exorcist that was as confusing as it was unusual:

"I wonder where the lizard-lady fits in..."

Link scribbled down that quote.

* * *

I retain the lisence to make shit up, especially this Jenni stuff.


	3. Foresight

**Foresight**_  
_

_Christmas looked like it was going to be awful this year. Plans, schedules and activities were dashed as heavy blizzards set in during the night. Snow had begun to fall early that winter and with each progressive day it deepened and the storms worsened to the point that it was futile to do anything about it. And Jennifer had been so looking forward to visiting her mama the next morning. _

_She stoked the fire a little and glanced wryly at the electric heater. She thought herself lucky – being able to afford a luxury like that by virtue of nothing but her husband's highly demanded and highly paid middle class job as a doctor – but she had grown up in a household that hadn't delivered such luxuries. She had only left it for a little more than a year and she already missed the chilly winter months when the electricity would cut out and she and her brother and her sisters would huddle around the fireplace in a dark room watching the snowflakes sail past the frosty windows almost luminescent against the night. Electricity in this fashionable country house was slightly more reliable but not to be counted on in this weather. So she kept the fire burning bright, if not for an emergency blackout then just for the atmosphere. _

_An uncomfortable little kick in the kidney. Jennifer rubbed her swollen stomach and heaved herself off of the little stool in front of the fire to go and stand in front of the Christmas tree. Her ankles had swollen terribly and the star-shaped cuts on her feet stung as she moved. The stitches in her left side stretched and ached, threatening to bleed again. Glancing up at the white-robed angel on top of the colourful tree she imagined that it was the Angel Gabriel telling her of God's wish like he did for Mary of Nazareth. She sighed placing her hands gingerly on the branches of the Christmas tree. _

"_I'm such a child," she whispered to herself. What could mysterious holy wounds prove? There was no immaculate conception and she was certainly no longer a virgin. _

_Her portrait of Mary was propped up on the mantelpiece just for tonight. Her husband was not a devout man by any means although he told everyone he met that he was a Christian. The virgin was beautiful, dressed in blue and surrounded by the aureole. Just for Christmas, Jennifer had flanked the portrait with two tall, white candles with a base of mistletoe. Their flames burned evenly. She could never be a mother like Mary. She was not blessed and she was so plain with a long face and nose and long copper-red hair. _

_Eventually she had to look away from the painting as if it was offensive; the perfect woman that her parents taught her to aspire to but at the same time told her she could never measure up to. Despite her own shortcomings she had a feeling in her heart that her baby would be wonderful. Maybe it was something that all mothers felt. At least to her, the baby would be perfect. _

_She tensed when she felt a tight squeeze around her body. Was it a contraction? But it was too early! She had to find the midwife. _

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_

Allen was definitely in better spirits now that he was full and some poor person in the kitchen was left with a pile of dishes a mile high. Timcanpy gnawed on a bone that had been stripped clean. Everyone had already become accustomed to the spectacle of Allen eating and could now ignore it. Link put down his cutlery daintily and dabbed at his mouth with a napkin. Allen was about to stand up and stretch but stopped himself when he heard a familiar voice calling him:

"Allen, you're here early tonight. How'd your mission go?"

"It was fine, Lenalee," Allen replied, pushing his dishes aside so that they were all piled in front of Link now. Lenalee sat down opposite to Allen.

"That's good," she said, looking a bit more serious now. "But why haven't you handed in your mission report?"

"Tell Komui to clean up his desk once in a while and he might find it."

Lenalee laughed. "I'll make sure he gets to it tonight then."

"I guess Miranda and Krory are on a mission right now," Allen said, noticing that they weren't around. Lenalee nodded. "And Kanda too, it seems..."

Oh, but he spoke too soon. When a dark shadow approached him instinct told him that he had to activate his innocence. Crown Clown came out just in time to stop the aforementioned exorcist from slicing through his neck. "What the hell, Kanda. I didn't even do anything yet."

"You're the little worm who brought the old loon back with you," Kanda growled.

Allen sighed. Of course, Kanda would try to kill him before he tried to kill anyone else... either him or Lavi.

"Pay twenty dollars to have an amazing holy experience!" Michael peddled across the cafeteria. Allen and Kanda turned but remained locked in their stalemate.

"Twenty dollars? You offered it to me for five!" Allen yelled at him.

"Yeah, well, I had to return the favour. Who would have thought that Noah's Ark still existed? The Pope's gonna get a kick out of that. I'll sell the info for a fortune!"

"The Pope already knows," Allen replied.

"Oh..."

"Why did you bring him here?" Kanda snarled, renewing his attempts to kill Allen.

"We had to get Hevlaska to confirm if his cup had innocence in it."

"It sure does! That means I get to stick around," Michael told them, just causing Kanda to get even angrier. "Hey, can I wear a cool outfit like you guys?"

"It's an odd shape, though," Lenalee noted, examining the cross that she could see on one side. It was similar to the crosses that some of the anti-akuma weapons bore. "Do you think that it might be the Holy Grail, then?"

"What would the Holy Grail be doing in Canada?" Allen deadpanned.

"Who knows? Maybe thievery and peddling got it there," Lenalee speculated.

"Yeah... thievery," Michael repeated, a bit shifty-eyed. "Speaking of which, look at what I found in the chapel." He reached into the inside pocket of his tattered coat and pulled out a large, round piece of bread with a cross printed in the middle. "At one of the local churches in my area the priest gave out smaller versions of these for free."

"That's called communion and _that_ is a holy item representing the body of Christ," Link scolded. "How dare you steal that from its rightful place!"

"What exactly is it?" Allen asked. Kanda also seemed confused by the appearance of the bread and deactivated Mugen. "Is it edible?"

"Of course it is," Link answered. "The only difference between this bread and ordinary bread is that this has no yeast to make it rise."

"Okay," Allen chirped, plucking the bread from Michael's hands and wolfing it down in three bites. All those who were looking gaped at him incredulously. Kanda growled at him.

"You stupid Beansprout! You didn't leave any!"

"My name's Allen, BaKanda. If you wanted to try it you should have said so earlier."

Link sighed and slapped himself in the face, leaving his hand where it landed. "I can't believe the ignorance of these fools who are supposed to be apostles of God." Allen and Kanda looked at him bemusedly.

"Guys," Lenalee began to explain, "In the Catholic Church you only have the right to eat that bread if you've been baptised. Baptism is a special rite that you have to take before you can have the right to call yourself Catholic."

"Man... I was going to charge you two dollars for that," Michael moaned. "From now on, you owe me two dollars."

"Sorry, I didn't realise..." Allen apologised.

Sensing the atmosphere beginning to tense up the way it usually did when Allen felt guilty, Lenalee added, "So, what do you do with that cup again?"

"This?" Michael held up his goblet. "It gives you almighty visions."

"I'm sure it does when you fill it with _ganja_," Allen joked.

"Fill it with what?" Kanda asked, genuinely ignorant.

"How do you even know what that is?" Link enquired.

"Cross dabbled once. It wasn't fun... at least not for me." Allen's entire aura darkened when he was overcome by yet another horrid memory of his apprenticeship.

"Nah, nah, it doesn't work like that," Michael said. He swiped someone's water glass and poured the contents into the goblet. "You just drink whatever's inside."

He pushed the goblet to Allen's lips and tipped it. Allen spluttered when water suddenly gushed into his mouth, down his throat and up his nose. He gulped down what he could and snorted up the water in his nose, politely excusing himself afterwards. There was a brief, warm pulse in his belly but after a whole minute of staring into space, he had yet to see anything remarkable.

"What's the vision like?" Lenalee whispered, afraid to break the quiet that had descended upon the room.

"I can't see anything."

"What? You went blind?" Kanda snapped.

"No, moron, I mean I can't see any visions."

"Hm... maybe we need to put stronger stuff in it," Michael suggested, nabbing Link's half-full wine glass and tipping it into the golden cup.

"Excuse me," Link retorted. "Please exercise some self-control. Stealing is a sin after all."

"Yeah, and besides," Allen added, "I'm not twenty-one yet so I can't drink alcohol."

"Come on! The priest also hands out free wine to kids half your age and we are in a building owned by the Vatican. You have an excuse."

"But that's for a religious ritual-" Allen protested but once again found the beverage in the goblet nearly drowning him. He forced it down the same way he had before and gagged at the awful bitter taste of alcohol. The group paused again, waiting for some kind of reaction from Allen. He could definitely feel something this time. Another warm pulse vibrated through his body, followed by another and then another. The continuous wave of pulses made his skin tingle and his head slightly dizzy.

"Allen, are you okay?" he could faintly hear Lenalee. "You're shaking."

Allen lifted his hands and looked at them. His vision swayed but he could see them tremble. "I-I think I sh-should lie d-down," he stammered as his jaw shivered. He tried to stand up but his shaky knees buckled. His ears began to ring and the pulses in his body seared to the point that he couldn't hear or feel anything else even when he hit the ground. There was nothing but blurs in his eyes that twisted everything into an indistinguishable mass of colour until darkness seeped in.

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By the time he awoke it was night. Faint moonlight from a half-moon shone through the open window of the infirmary. Allen knew that that's where he was; he could smell the familiar scent of disinfectant and sterility in the air. He felt a bit groggy as though he'd woken up from a long, peaceful sleep. His spine popped when he stretched, causing relief to flood into the stiff joints. After a few minutes of sitting up and rubbing sleep out of his eyes he felt much better; more energised. He flipped the sheets off and swung his legs over the side of the bed. There was no one in here with him, not even Howard Link. That pushy matron had probably ushered him out and for once Allen was grateful for her overbearing nature.

His clothes were folded neatly on the nightstand and his boots were placed at the foot of the bed. Smiling at the thought of someone extending such kindness towards him, he reached for his clothes. He stopped suddenly, noticing something moving within his clothes. A little golden ball with wings popped out of the collar of his shirt. Allen chuckled; really, he should have guessed. He picked up his clothes and put them on, only by force of habit if nothing else.

"_Go to the Ark." _

Allen gasped and nearly dropped the boot he was putting on. A whispery voice had come out at him from nowhere. Timcanpy didn't seem to be bothered, or maybe the golem couldn't hear it.

"_Go to the Ark. Someone's waiting to meet you." _

Allen blinked. He zipped up his boot and stood up. The golden golem fluttered up to his shoulder, sensing that its master was about to take a bold action. To be honest, Allen had no idea why he was doing this: reciting the song in his head. An Ark gate opened up below him. The unauthorised use of the Ark at this time was a stupid thing to do but Allen went anyway.

* * *

I made an update! Achievement!

btw, glossary points:

_ganja_: sanskrit word for marijuana.

_"you only have the right to eat that bread if you've been baptised"_ - a reference to Holy Communion, the act of eating bread and wine that represent the body and blood of Christ.


	4. Reflection

**Reflection**

It was cold and snowy in London. Allen clutched his exorcist coat a bit tighter around himself when a brief, chilly breeze nipped through. He didn't know why he'd chosen to come here. It was more of an impulse, really. After getting into the Ark he didn't really know what to do from there. He couldn't find anyone there who might have been waiting for him. Although he knew it would have been a better move to return to Headquarters before someone found out what he'd done, especially Link, he actually felt like a walk. London seemed as good a place as any.

It was very late and the streets were quiet in this part of the city. Dirty, grimy sludge that was once snow was topped off by new flakes so that it would be fresh by morning. He just walked. Down through streets of crowded houses and streetlights lit like they were full of fireflies and then into a park. Lamps lined the pavement to light the path for late travellers. Everything else was drenched in darkness. And yet he was able to notice a patch of unlit park that wasn't so dark. A pond that had been frozen over caught as much light from the faraway streetlamps and reflected it straight up into the sky like a moon on earth. Allen stepped off the path and made his way to the edge of the water. He knelt down. There wasn't enough light to cast a reflection back to him, only to cast a shadow on the ice. Allen smiled at the single shadow he saw staring back at him. Timcanpy perched on Allen's shoulder, looking between the ice pond and Allen's expression and becoming confused. But to Allen, the fact that he could only see one figure looking back at him was incredible. He felt a completely affirmed for the first time in quite a while that he would remain. It was only a shadow but he knew that it was his shadow.

Not the Fourteenth's. Allen's... and this body that cast the shadow was his too.

After staring at his own shadow on the ice for such a long time, Allen had to nurse his head in his hand. Something had started to throb there and while it wasn't painful it was still certainly a test of his patience and endurance. He decided he'd rest his eyes a little bit – maybe staring in the dim light had made his brain tired.

Timcanpy fluttered off Allen's shoulder in alarm as he abruptly stood up without even warning his golem. Realising who he saw, Timcanpy swelled a few sizes.

The Fourteenth turned around, brushing Allen's hair out of his face. "You can come out of hiding brother. I have already felt you here."

The boy who walked out from behind the bushes looked like he was just a homeless bum but he had snow white hair and three extra eyes on his forehead. "I guess there was never any fooling you," he sighed, "Mr. Pianist."

Allen awoke all of a sudden, wobbling on his feet since he couldn't remember when he'd stood up. He'd just closed his eyes for a little bit...

"I sensed you coming here, Exorcist... or should I say Noah? I daresay you can't be both."

Allen looked up and gawked at the poverty-stricken youth. "Who are you?" he demanded, itching to activate his anti-akuma weapon should this guy turn out to be an akuma.

"So you're not fully awake yet," the boy said with a whine. "And you don't even remember me! How much worse can you get? Of course, I'm a Noah and I would like you to call me Wisely."

"Noah!" Allen spat, preparing a full blown launch of his Innocence.

"What am I doing here? I live here. London is my hometown and birthplace... or at least of my latest host."

Allen blinked and stepped down in his bemusement. How did Wisely know the questions he wanted the answers to before he asked them?

"Because I'm psychic. As if you couldn't see that based on the first answer."

Allen gaped at him.

"Yes, Allen Walker, I can read your mind," Wisely affirmed. "And I do know why you're here. Must be tough trying to fight your genes, eh? You want to somehow stop becoming a Noah. You hate us, don't you? We make you angry." The Noah laughed. "It's already too late for you. You're the same as the Fourteenth anyway. What difference would it make if you were to become him?"

Allen stepped back and clenched his fists. "I'm not like you Noah!"

"Au contraire, Exorcist. I have the memories to judge that. And then of course there's the mystery of your dear mummy eating away at you from the back of your mind."

Allen froze and his eyes widened. He wished the Noah could have refrained from mentioning her.

"Do you want to know what happened to her?" Wisely tempted, stepping closer to Allen.

Allen activated his Innocence and wrapped Clown Belt around Wisely's arms and legs. "Stay right there! Don't move!" Allen commanded, rushing in with his claw ready to strike.

Wisely smirked, activating his own Noah abilities. Allen lost concentration when a giant replica of Wisely's largest eye opened up below the both of them. The Exorcist was mesmerised by the bright iris and felt his mind being sucked into it. Trapped in his own ability, Wisely could also feel his mind being sucked into another dimension but he let it affect him. After all, he had no real knowledge of this Fourteenth's past so this might turn out to be interesting.

* * *

**Such a short chapter as this one is really unusual for me...** but there's the next chapter. Also, I have no real knowledge of what England is like, or London for that matter.


	5. Pray For Love

**Pray For Love**

Allen looked around at the room he'd entered. The window was dark save for the layers of snow lining the panes. There was a beautiful, hand-carved pinewood crib against one wall and a rocking chair in the corner. A man dressed in dark grey pressed trousers and a matching vest with a long-sleeved, white dress shirt was leaning against a pinewood chest of drawers looking grim. Beside the crib was a single bed dressed in white sheets. A maid went around the room wordlessly bringing a tray of tea to go on the bedside table, setting the crib mattress with new sheets and taking away a basket full of bloodstained sheets when she left. A midwife stood by the bed smiling yet solemn as she gazed at the woman on the bed. She wasn't a gorgeous woman by any means – not like the scaled lady of the akuma's soul. She was very short but all of her features were long and thin, giving the impression that she might be tall if she was standing. In her arms she cradled a small baby wrapped in white swaddling cloth. Even though Allen couldn't see the baby he knew it must have been there since the red-haired woman cradling it was cooing gently to it.

"What are you going to do, Mrs. Morrow?" asked the midwife, concern laced in her voice. Allen blinked and gasped, realising that that woman must have been his mother.

"What do you mean?" asked Jennifer, looking away from her baby. "There's nothing to be worried about."

"Of course there is!" the man across the room suddenly thundered, surprising the two women and making the baby cry. Jennifer immediately turned her attention back to it and rocked and sang softly. "This blizzard is a problem but as soon as the businesses can reopen that child has to have that arm surgically removed immediately."

Jennifer gasped. "Surely not. He's only a newborn. There's nothing wrong with him."

The man turned around and walked towards the bed, pointing at the baby the whole time. "Nothing wrong? Look at that arm!"

Jennifer slowly unwrapped the cloth binding her baby and lifted the child's left arm. It was shrunken and crippled and the fourth and fifth fingers were fused together, making him three-fingered on one hand.

"Believe me, Jennifer; it will be harder for him to live with that arm than to just get rid of it now."

"It's not that bad," Jennifer argued. "It still bends the right way. And his fingers still curl around mine." She put her index finger in his palm to prove her point. The wrinkled, deformed fingers stiffly wrapped around hers. The baby gurgled. "He can still use this arm."

"But look at it. It's hideous! People will look at him like he's a monster when they see those fingers and that flesh. The rest of society will revile him."

"They'll only pity him if one of his arms is missing."

"Neither will make a good life for this boy," the midwife interjected. "However, I believe it is better to be pitied than to be scorned."

"No. I want to leave him like this," Jennifer sobbed. "God made him this way. There is nothing wrong with God's creation. Most babies who enter surgery don't survive. My baby may be ugly but God made him capable."

"Does he look like he'll ever be capable enough to find a job? To live on his own? To find a wife?" Adrian retorted. "Babies are unfortunately fragile creatures. The surgery is a necessary risk. Maybe it will be better if he dies to avoid whatever horrible outcome awaits him in life."

"How dare you!" Jennifer yelled at him in a shrill voice. "You would rather send your child to his grave than bother to love him in life simply because of an outward appearance? How dare you! Get out!"

"I can already see the futility of standing here and arguing with you. It's Christmas already. I'll give you the entire day to consider the options. I'm sure you'll see the logic in my view. Hopefully by tomorrow the storm will also have eased up."

Adrian Morrow strode out of the room. His wife glared at him angrily as he left. The midwife put a hand on Jennifer's shoulder as a comfort.

"Mrs. Morrow," she said gently, "I'm sorry for your misfortune."

"O, you get out too! Leave me alone."

The midwife sighed sadly and left the room the same as Adrian had done. Jennifer tucked the baby's deformity away inside the blankets and rewrapped them. She stroked the child's face sadly.

"Only your arm is ugly," she whispered to him. "But if only you could see your own face. God blessed you with your face and your sparkling eyes. I don't see how this could be a punishment. You're only a newborn – you've done nothing wrong. I am sure that God has a special purpose for you. Please live, my little one, and fulfil your God given duty. I will assist you."

Allen went to stand next to the bed and looked over Jennifer's shoulder. Nobody seemed to be able to see him. He had seen the deformity of the child's left arm and he thought that it wasn't him. Although he had no idea where he originally got his Innocence, he'd assumed he was born with it but the baby's arm had a normal colouration and his hand bore no cross. Not only that but if Allen hadn't heard the conversation beforehand he would have had no idea of the child's gender looking at him now. It didn't seem to be him, but according to Lavi this was Jennifer's only child... unless there was a twin somewhere.

"Is that you, then?" Wisely asked leaning over the other side of the bed.

"I don't know for sure. It could be me... but my arm was never like that," Allen replied absently, too absorbed in the moment to care that he was talking to a Noah.

"It seems you haven't acquired your Innocence yet."

"Do you believe that this is really me?"

"Well, I am only here to look into _your_ past and as a psychic I do feel that I'm adept enough in the usage of my powers to land an accurate memory dive. I'm sure that this is definitely you."

Allen looked away from the baby and up at the woman holding him. He reached up to touch her face but like a mere projection his hand just phased through her. The love and care she had held in her voice when she defended him touched the core of his heart.

xxxxxxxx

The entire house was dark when Jennifer made her move. Still wobbly and weak from birthing, she dressed herself in thick, woollen clothes and put on her warm boots. Escaping through the door would be no good; the snow was too deep and the doors were obstructed. So instead, she climbed through a window. The snow came up almost to the window sill and Jennifer found herself thigh-deep in it. Progress was slow, wet and freezing cold as she crossed the property to the fence at the back where the woods began. She held her baby – still unnamed – close to her chest inside her coat. The wind blew snowflakes all around her and carved crosses on her cheeks while she looked for a particular section of the fence where the wooden crossbar was loose. Pushing it from its fixing allowed her to clear the fence with ease. She replaced it when she was done. Her footprints were being quickly filled and the blood that seeped from her bandages was covered. The snow that had blown in while the window was open melted and dried so that by morning it would seem that she had disappeared into thin air.

Thanks to the canopy of trees the snow on the floor of the woods was much thinner, only coming up to her ankles. Jennifer moved as quickly as she could, not quite able to run (she stumbled when she tried). When the sky began to get lighter, she was completely lost in a thick part of the woods. By that time also she was too weak to carry on. Looking down she almost thought she was heavily menstruating. With her head dizzy and her face pale she realised she had no other option but to give in now. She leaned against a tree trunk and slid down to the ground. Hot tears streamed down her face. This was not what she wanted. She wanted to escape; reach the next town or find a convent or monastery where she could entrust her baby to those who she knew would care for him. She clasped her hands together and prayed desperately to God for a miracle – for someone to find them. Someone kind who would take her child and raise it with love and generosity.

Her prayers were swiftly answered.

Somewhere nearby a woman, unfortunate since childhood, had just had another misfortune: stillbirth. Dead before it had even lived, the woman was forced to bury her daughter prematurely but she owned no graveyard plots nor did she have any funds to pay for a funeral or a casket. Wrapped entirely in a dirty blanket, her baby girl was buried beneath a mighty tree in the snowy woods. She laid a pile of stones as a grave marker and a handful of handpicked snowdrops. She stood before the small pile of freshly turned earth and stones and wept, despite feeling cold and wet. Her clothing was too thin for this bitter weather.

A baby's cry cut through the silent wood. She gasped and stared down at her makeshift grave. It must have been her imagination. The grave was still and she was certain that her baby was dead. She listened more closely, realising that the sound came from a different part of the woods. She knelt down to kiss her child's resting place before moving on to investigate the crying.

What she found shocked her. Another woman lay against a tree with a crying baby close to her chest. Her body was covered in bloody wounds that stained her bandages. She was alive but weak and covered with a layer of snow. Jennifer looked up at the strange woman and smiled.

"You've come…" she croaked.

The woman blinked. She had no idea that this stranger was expecting her. "Who are you? What happened to you?"

"There's no time, it's already dawn and they will start to look for us," Jennifer replied. With frozen fingers she began to remove her coat.

"What are you saying?" the woman exclaimed, putting a cold but substantially warmer hand on Jennifer's to stop her. "Keep wearing it, you need to stay warm. I'll go and find some help…"

"No! No! You don't understand!" Jennifer gasped. "My baby was born last night. He is only slightly unfortunate but… my husband – and surely the other doctors – want to perform surgery on him! You know babies very often die in surgery. But there's no wrong in loving my son just the way he is. However… I'm afraid that I won't be able to." Jennifer pulled her coat off completely and handed it to the strange woman before her. One by one, the other articles of her clothing came away and were used to wrap her baby up tightly in a makeshift swaddle.

"Please love him."

The strange woman took the baby from his mother's arms with a warm smile. Despite being covered up entirely save for the face, Jennifer noticed a small opening between her sleeve and her wrist. It seemed that her skin had been discoloured somehow. The redhead just sighed and leaned back, closing her tired eyes; ready for sleep.

* * *

**Now the plot finally moves. **And just so you know:

glossary:

_"Most babies who enter surgery don't survive"_ - until the 1950s anesthetic wasn't used on infants going into surgery because the conventional mode of thinking at the time was that since babies were just born and their nerve systems weren't fully developed they couldn't really feel pain or stress. This is, of course, untrue and led to the undue deaths of many babies.

_"she owned no graveyard plots nor did she have any funds to pay for a funeral"_ - It's a rather old practice but some families still do this; people used to have to own a piece of land in a graveyard if they wanted to be buried appropriately, otherwise it was mass grave for you. Some families would own a great big plot where the whole family would be buried when they died.


	6. Judgement

**Judgement**

A big tent appeared over them, filled with cages and stages all hosting some sort of show. There was a heavy stench of animal fur, urine and dung mixed distastefully with the more pleasant smells of popcorn, hotdogs and perfume wafting from the patrons of this event. The young promoter shouted over the raucous crowd, advertising the latest spectacle they had come across to put on display. Allen nodded his head vaguely, stepping through the crowd on his way to find out why his memory had brought him here.

"Is this place familiar?" Wisely asked from somewhere very close behind him.

Allen shrieked and almost jumped a few feet into the air. Apparently Wisely had been following right behind him. "Shit, I forgot you were here. And what happened to being able to read my mind?"

"Well, I'm concentrating on doing something else at the moment," Wisely answered pointedly.

Allen sighed. "Yeah, it's a familiar place. This was the circus I lived with until I was finally adopted. This is the sideshow tent."

He'd never liked this place. The circus could be fun but this tent was terrible, dreary and miserable. The people came to be amused by the bizarre acts and displays that were too weird or too trite to be shown in the main event: girls who could swallow swords, men who could eat fire and then spit it out in a great fireball, a foreign man who could sit quite comfortably on a mat of spikes, a six-legged deer and more.

Allen passed the cage of the six-legged deer and blinked. It was a calf, still suckling from its mother. He didn't remember the deer being this young. In the next cage was a more familiar display: the Tree Man. He had vegetation growing off his body in branches and in some places like moss, giving him the appearance of an old forest tree. Allen remembered the year that he died.

"So it's a freak show?" Wisely piped up again.

"Sort of," Allen replied. "It's a sideshow but part of it became the showing off of a bunch of people who just so happened to be weird."

"Like you?"

"Luckily, no. I was never made fun of in a tent."

The next act was one he hadn't seen before. He stepped up to it just as the promoter came over to interest the crowd.

"Step right this way folks," he exclaimed, "for something you won't ever get to see anywhere else in this country or the next. Her origins are a mystery. Where did she come from? How did she get here? Why was she born? Ladies and gentlemen, this is the beautifully bizarre Dragon Lady!"

Allen gasped when he saw her. It was the same woman who'd taken Jennifer's precious baby and the same woman he'd seen in the akuma's soul. Her scales weren't as complete as they were when he first saw her; she didn't have the elfin ears yet and her ridges weren't as prominent. She had less scales but they were just as shiny as they would be later in her life. She paid the crowd no attention as she was busy breastfeeding a baby wrapped up in a blanket. The child was completely hidden from view under the cloth until it lifted its left arm out of the bindings.

"Look mommy! The Dragon Lady has a Dragon Baby!" a little girl giggled, pointing at the deformed left arm.

"Never made fun of in a tent, eh?" Wisely sniggered while Allen gaped.

xxxxxxxx

The event wore on and people started to leave. Allen stayed beside the Dragon Lady's exhibit all day while Wisely, getting bored, paced the tent examining the other spectacles, such as a 'unicorn' that was obviously fake. When all of the patrons had left the tent flap that had openly welcomed them was closed and the cleanup began. Any act that was considered 'human' was herded outside and left to its own devices. The Dragon Lady went with them, keeping her newly acquired baby safe and warm in her arms. It was still very cold but the woman now had the fine clothes given to her by Jennifer Morrow that were more efficient than her old rags. The fire-breathing men set up a hookah and the man on the spikes lit up a pipe. It didn't look like there was going to be much more action here.

Wisely sighed. "Maybe we should be moving on-"

"That damn brat…"

"Hallo!" Wisely exclaimed. Both he and Allen turned to the Tree Man who had spoken right next to them. They hadn't noticed that he was that close to them. The man stomped up to the Dragon Lady, eyeing the infant with a scowl and then stomped right past her. The Dragon Lady lifted the baby's head to rest on her shoulder while he slept and watched the Tree Man cautiously as he passed her.

"Please don't be angry with me," she whispered.

"How can I not be angry with you!" the man roared, shocking the other circus performers. "How could you replace her at all, let alone with another freak like him? She was normal."

The Dragon Lady looked down at the ground, rocking the stirring baby and rubbing his back to soothe him. "He and his dying mother were all alone in the woods. If I left him there he would have died with her. I couldn't allow that, freak or not. Besides, only his arm is ugly. It looks like the rest of him will be beautiful and very normal." She stroked the finely growing strands of auburn hair as she spoke.

"You selfish woman! Can't you even give a man the time to grieve for his losses? Such a blow to the heart this is."

The Tree Man stalked away, possibly to find somewhere private to cry. The rest of the sideshow troupe sat in awkward silence while the men smoked and the women simply huddled around each other to stay warm. Allen gulped, feeling quite awkward himself even though he wasn't actually a part of the scene.

"I wonder what happened," he thought aloud.

"I think it's pretty obvious," Wisely said. "Those two must have been romantically involved and had a daughter together but for some reason she died just before the Dragon Lady picked you up."

"I can understand," Allen muttered. "Normal children would be important to parents who are both considered to be freaks. They give their parents hope."

Wisely groaned. "Are you going to give me a self-pitying, self-beat-up speech now?"

Allen glared at him. Wisely shrugged. "I'm just saying that you probably have the same bullshit martyr complex that the Fourteenth had."

The sideshow promoter could be seen approaching the group after having a short conversation with the ringmaster (who was slightly less fat than Allen remembered him, or maybe the boy's disdain of the man had just added a few pounds to his memory). Knowing that the promoter was definitely going to call them away, the sword-swallowing girls found their voices again to make one last conversation:

"He does look precious," said the oldest girl of the group – a young woman with a large ring through the middle of her nose like a bull. "Have you named him yet? Or did he already have a name?"

The Dragon Lady gazed at her child. "I don't know… how could I ever find out if he had a name?"

"Well just give 'im a new one, then," said a sword-swallower who'd tried to make herself blonde with alcohol and lemon juice. "Who's ever goin' t' know?"

Before the Dragon Lady could reply the promoter had arrived, asking the sword-swallowers and fire-breathers (who were all still young) to help the crew empty and pack up the tents in preparation for travel the next day.

"Oh, I'll help too," the Dragon Lady offered.

"Nah, you just look after him," the promoter said, watching in fascination as the baby boy's eyes opened just a little bit to have a look around. The young boy smiled at the baby and reached out to tickle his chin in a friendly gesture but recoiled when the baby moved his left arm out of his cloths and into the open. The promoter turned around and jogged after the young sword-swallowers and fire-breathers.

The world darkened and all of a sudden Allen found himself staring at a mirror in a very dimly lit caravan. On both sides of the caravan were a bed and a couple of hammocks for the women of the sideshow. The only light in the small box was a candle beside one bed. The Dragon Lady laid awake, hovering over her baby boy and rubbing him to make sure that he stayed warm while she spoke to him.

"Please don't worry, little boy, about what people say to you now. You're beautiful and when you are older, you will be wonderful. I remember being a child. Everyone told me that I would be splendid, beautiful and marry a great, wealthy man who might become a knight… but look at me now. I'm ugly. I am absolutely sure that you will grow to be judged by your character, not by your beauty. You wonderful, lucky child."

She kissed the baby on the forehead gently, then leaned over to blow out the candle for the night.

* * *

**I was ahead of my schedule** this week so I just updated early. I don't think I have any specific glossary points, except that I did come up with the Tree Man's condition based on the real "tree man". Severe Human Papillomavirus (HPV) can cause such a thing in people with exceptionally weak immune systems but it's quite easily treated. As for the Dragon Lady, her condition is based on ichthyosis; a family of genetic diseases that cause a hardening of the skin and creating "scales" but there is no real life example that matches hers, I made it up based on the symptoms.


	7. Not Inhuman

**Not Inhuman**

The roof lifted and they were inside the tent again. This time, as well as a chatter of the crowd and the calls of the animals in the sideshow there was the added cacophony of a storm outside, beating down on the roof of the tent. The thunder clapped, making a few children scream and some adults cover their hearts. The Dragon Lady was in her usual place, nursing the baby Allen contentedly despite the terrible weather but her eyes were dimmed. She gazed at Allen not with the gentle, nurturing kindness she'd had only months before but with a simmering anger. The disease that afflicted her had also been spreading; she'd almost reached the stage Allen first saw her at. The older Allen stayed by her exhibit and watched her with great concern, wondering what had happened. Wisely, who was already starting to get a bit bored by this story, looked around the tent. His eyes fell on one circus goer and widened.

"Earl!" he exclaimed, making Allen whip his head around.

The aristocratic gentleman who appeared to be in his late twenties wasn't familiar to Allen but the little girl who'd come with him was. If Road Camelot was with him, then it was highly likely that that man was the Millennium Earl.

"I wonder what he's doing here," Wisely muttered. Allen hung his head, having pieced it together.

"Can we stop this?" he asked.

Wisely looked at him. "Why?"

"I don't want to watch anymore."

"Too bad, because now I do." Wisely turned his gaze back to the Millennium Earl, smirking.

Allen knew vaguely what would probably happen at this stage. When he'd met this woman the first time she was an akuma. That was what the Millennium Earl was there for, wasn't it?

He turned back to the Dragon Lady. Her expression had hardly changed but Allen could see her lips moving and he wasn't sure if she was singing or speaking. Unable to interact directly with the memory, Allen stepped through the barrier to her exhibit like a ghost. She didn't look up but adjusted her clothes and the baby that had finished feeding. She spoke quietly and Allen couldn't quite make sense of what she was saying; if she was talking to herself or talking to the baby version of him.

"I wish it wasn't so. What did we do to make God so angry with us? Why does He think we deserve this misery and derision? And now the people who look at each other with kindness only hold rejection. How has it finally come to this? The little baby is guilty of nothing and yet someone wants to blame him for everything. Surely, a merciful God wouldn't allow this." The baby gurgled and burped. She adjusted his position again so that he was cradled in her arms. "You need to learn a very important lesson, little one. It seems, though I can't understand why, that in order to reap the reward of religion we must not believe in its God. For some reason, the shepherd takes for granted his own flock and only gives his greatest kindness to those that will not join the herd."

She tapped the baby gently on the tip of the nose, making him smile. "Therefore, you should live only on the cusp of faith."

"Ugh, you have such an ugly baby," a little girl giggled. Allen looked up and scowled when he saw Road leaning on the barrier with her fingertips pressed together. "Haven't you named him yet?"

The Dragon Lady gawked at her in astonishment. No circus-goer had ever bothered to speak directly to her or ask her questions before. Road smirked.

"Is there something stopping you? Don't you really love him?"

Allen stepped forward with his innocence activated. The world around him swayed and lines of static appeared across his vision like an interrupted transmission. Road didn't move. He swiped across her body but his claws just slipped straight through. She continued to smirk but her body appeared to be warped by the simple act of moving his fingers through it.

"Hey, put that away," Wisely snapped. "Your Innocence is messing with my powers."

Allen allowed his Innocence to deactivate while he glared at Road. The warped memory projection image righted itself shortly afterwards but the after-effects remained: there were still discrete lines of white static flitting across Allen's vision and Road's voice cracked and skipped.

"Wh-wh-wh-wh-why not-t-t-t?" Road goaded. "… He-he-he-he's no-no… –nough to fi-i-i-ill the-the-the void of yo… yo-yo-yo… l-loss. At-t-t-t-t le-le-le-le-le-le-le-le…"

The image paused.

"Bollocks!" Wisely cursed. "Look what you've done you dozy trollop! How am I going to fix this now?"

The image spun like a roll of film slowing down. Allen kept his attention concentrated on Road. What was she about to say? She seemed to have a potential answer to the many questions that were surfacing in his mind. The spinning finally stopped and Road began to speak again, right from where she left off:

"… Least not for him." She cocked her head in a particular direction. The image skipped a bit but was otherwise understandable. Allen turned to look in that direction. The Tree Man sat alone at his post, as always, with the Millennium Earl standing in front of him, not talking, just observing for now.

Allen turned back to the Dragon Lady. She glared fiercely at Road. "Don't make any mistake, any decision I make for this child is out of love for him and only him, not obligation to anyone, especially not for those who would hold derision for someone who is as of yet guiltless."

"Even a lover?"

The Dragon Lady looked away. Road laughed at her.

"Oh, you're so ridiculous! You know that caring for that lame baby and rekindling your love are incompatible. My advice would be to take the baby over the fungus. Who would want to love that thing anymore?"

"You know nothing of love."

Road blew a raspberry. Then smirked. "I'll get an axe and trim some of those branches of his." She chuckled when the Dragon Lady shifted uncomfortably. "What's that matter? You two aren't even friends anymore, are you?"

"We'll see."

"He told you that child is destined to go to Hell," Road grinned.

"He said no such thing."

"Or something to that effect. He's convinced that the child must be some form of demon or embodiment of Satan that appeared before you to commit you to evil. Evil things will happen to you because of him. Why does he think that anyway?"

The Dragon Lady shook her head. "He let his grief overcome him. He's right, though, I made a mistake. Because I adopted a new baby his grief grew and his heart closed up. He can't see light anymore. And he wants to be angry at me for taking mercy upon a poor dying soul and offering charity to an abnormal child." Her voice rose and she visibly shook with emotion.

"Abnormal? Is that the only reason? Or would it be because you chose the little boy over any child of his?"

"How could I have refused in the circumstance?" she shrieked, grabbing the attention of many patrons. The promoter threw an irritated glare her way. "Why does everyone want to punish me for being kind? Why does everyone want to hate a baby that is not even capable of doing anything? How did we do wrong? We've done no wrong! We are good!"

There was a sudden bright flash outside and a loud, violent crack. The main tent post cracked down the middle and splintered and began to collapse as the canvas burst into flames. Circus goers screamed as panic flared in the tent. People rushed to the exit in a frantic stampede. The Dragon Lady held the baby Allen close and ran behind her stage to slide under a gap between the canvas and the ground. Allen looked around in shock, unsure of what to do. He was partially convinced that nothing would happen to him since this was only a memory but he couldn't help but to also panic as the tent caved in.

"Allen, come this way. Hurry up!"

Allen turned in surprise since that wasn't Wisely's voice. Road was standing in her special door, gesturing to him. He gawked at her. She should have just been part of his memory. Her brow creased as she quickly became impatient and Allen darted through her door seconds before the burning tent folded over him.

It was dark inside when the doors slammed shut but it gradually got lighter. Even so, all Allen could see was a few feet of purple and black tiles. He stayed still. His eyes darted all over the darkness.

"Road, what are you doing?" he asked.

"I'm just helping," she giggled. "I didn't want you to get hurt or anything. I really like you, Allen."

Allen looked down. He could see Road in all of the black tiles on the floor, each of them giving a different perspective of her.

"You're not satisfied? With your answers, I mean. You met your mother. Everything is fine now."

"It's not. She's dead… she's dead for loving me."

Road sighed. "You're still curious, aren't you? About the Dragon Lady. Why? You got what you originally wanted."

"But it explains nothing!"

"Does it? What were you hoping to be explained to you? Everything you needed to know about her was already written in text and you now know how she ties in with the Dragon Lady. Big mystery solved."

"No… nobody knew she was my mother and I don't know what happened to the Dragon Lady afterwards. Why did she love me? It obviously caused her a lot of heartbreak and inconvenience. Did it kill her too? Is that why she ended up as an akuma?"

"Hm…" Road muttered. "I see, that's what you really wanted to know. It's true that everyone who loved you most is dead."

"Does that include her?"

"Statistically, it's likely." Road cocked her head to the side, a wicked smirk spreading on her lips as she suddenly came to a realisation. "You're not curious about them at all, you're only curious about yourself."

"That's not true! I wanted to know my mother…"

"Why would you have ever wanted to know your mother? What could your mother, who died hours after you were born, ever offer you? She didn't owe you an apology or an explanation. Her actions were all quite self-explanatory. You just want to know how it all affected you. You're hoping that knowing what happened to you will give you what you need to change your fate. You can't just accept your destiny as the Destroyer of Time. If you find out how you got your Innocence, could you maybe find a way to get rid of it?"

"I don't want to get rid of it!" Allen shouted. "Because right now there are humans and akuma alike who are relying on me and this Innocence to save them."

"You would rather not," Road said with conviction. "To be honest, I'm _very_ curious about your Innocence, Allen. I wonder where it even comes from and if it's really the Heart."

Allen laughed softly. "We didn't quite get to that part. I'd always assumed I was born with it."

Road cocked her head to the side. "You can't be born with Innocence, Allen."

"Then will you let me get back to finding out?"

"I knew it, you just want to know about yourself," Road teased. "Not that that's a bad thing. You can't truly know the world unless you know yourself. But I'm afraid that won't happen."

"Why not?"

"I interfered with Wisely's ability and now his link into your mind is broken. A simple thank-you will suffice."

"Why did you interrupt?" Allen inquired. "Aren't you allies? I'm sure it would somehow benefit you to also understand my history. It would probably bring you closer to finding clues about the Heart and whether my Innocence is it. Why sabotage your own team?"

"Ooh! Allen, are trying to say that you want us to investigate? You don't mind letting the Noah see into your past?"

"I do mind but I don't understand your tactics at the moment."

The condescending expression fell from Road's face and a look at never failed to make Allen feel disconcerted in her presence appeared: a look of genuine sympathy.

"You know I really like you, Allen," she reiterated. "I don't think this past of yours is something that Wisely should know. This is between you and the Fourteenth. I'll let you go now, talking is really the only thing I can do from this position."

The dream world shattered into vast whiteness. Allen suddenly felt as though he was falling upwards. He was grateful but still had one more question for Road: "Why would you do this for me?"

"I'm a Noah, I'm not inhuman."

* * *

**I know it has been a long time since my last update** but it's not really my fault! I swear it! Anyway, I got a chapter up eventually. Are you happy?


	8. The Maiden's Prayer

**The Maiden's Prayer**

Half of the world was white and the other half dark as Allen found himself stumbling on solid ground with the sound of breaking glass all around him. Wisely stumbled backwards and fell onto his back. Allen tripped and managed to catch himself on a tree. He was very confused at first but as his blurry vision cleared he realised that he was still in the park that Wisely had found him in. He had no idea of the time. He cursed. He really should get back to Headquarters before anyone found out he had gone. A moan of pain distracted him. He looked and saw Wisely still lying on the ground, holding his hand over his largest extra eye. He clenched his teeth in pain and Allen guessed he must have had a searing headache.

"Ow… Road, you bitch!" Wisely hissed.

Allen took the opportunity to flee before Wisely could regain himself, grabbing Timcanpy by the tail. He wasn't comfortable about letting a Noah escape but he was not going to take any risks with the family at this stage.

xxxxxxxx

He stopped running after a while and just walked through the new, clean snow for a while. He assumed he was safe for now – there were no people around and his left eye wasn't pointing out any akuma. Now was a good time to summon the ark gate and return to HQ but whenever he tried to recite the song either in his head or out aloud he kept getting it wrong.

"_Why does everyone want to punish me for being kind?"_

He stopped next to some tall iron bars and looked up. On a small plot of land next to a decrepit old church was a graveyard. The weeds were long but not terribly overgrown due to the weather and the graves were cracked and covered in moss, although it was honestly no surprise that the graveyard was in such a condition when the church beside it wasn't very well kept either. The stone was eroded, the wood was chipped and splintered, some of the dirty, old windows were cracked or had panels missing that were replaced with slabs of wood and inside some of the ceiling beams were sagging. The floor was worn, the walls were mouldy and the pews also sagged and creaked when sat on. Allen took a seat in the front row and looked up at the large sculpture of the greatest Christian martyr hanging from the wall behind the altar. He looked serene. Somehow he had accepted his fate to die brutally, and for what reason?

"_Why do we deserve such misery and derision?" _

"I'm so sorry," Allen muttered to the figure. "You died to forgive us but you died in vain. Nothing that you did made the evil go away; maybe it just became stronger. And what can I do? The Noah… they represent the original will of God and want to destroy humanity for its sin and perhaps I'm no better than you. What good is my mercy in the face of destruction of the highest degree? What am I going to die for?"

"_How did we do wrong?"_

Allen propped his elbows on his knees and clasped his hands, resting his forehead on the knuckles of his thumbs. Timcanpy folded its wings and snuggled next to his thigh. Allen unwillingly fell asleep in that position while Timcanpy pretended to sleep for the fun of it. In the morning the early service filed in. Nobody paid much attention to the young boy who they thought was praying silently and desperately. The old priest spoke to a small audience and they sang and chanted for hours until the sun had climbed a bit higher into the sky. Towards the end of the service, Allen awoke to the sound of one of the final prayers being chanted.

"_Hail Mary, full of grace,  
The Lord is with thee…"_

He didn't interrupt, nor did he try to move much despite the aching in his arms, legs and back from his awkward position. He turned his head discretely and glanced sidelong at the woman sitting beside him. She had a small bouquet of hand-picked flowers tied together with a slightly frayed ribbon cut-off. She was a short, thin woman with her long, auburn hair tied in a thick plait down her back. She wore a dress and an apron that was clean but stained and had been patched up several times. Her boots were also worn out with some holes appearing at the toes and the soles were beginning to break away. Allen thought he might have been looking at Jennifer Morrow but he knew she was definitely dead. His left eye told him that she wasn't an akuma either but it did point out a couple further back in the pews.

"_Blessed art thou among women  
And blessed is the fruit of your womb, Jesus." _

She muttered her prayers quietly, inaudible against the chorus of the rest of the small gathering.

"_Holy Mary, Mother of God,  
Pray for us sinners now  
And at the hour of our death.  
Amen." _

Allen looked back down into his lap, wondering if anyone had noticed that he was an Exorcist or that perhaps while being hunched over like this nobody had seen his badge. Timcanpy squirmed a little bit beside him. He shifted his knee a little bit to nudge his golem, signalling it to be as still as it possibly could be.

The service ended and the group filed out behind the priest. All except for that one woman. She picked up her gloves, coat and bouquet and left the church through a side-door that went to the graveyard. Once she had left Allen finally got up, feeling great relief from the pressure that was lifted from his elbows and knees and trying his best to stretch out his stiff limbs. He felt and heard many of his joints popping. Timcanpy fluttered from the pew and deposited itself in Allen's hood as its master followed the woman out into the graveyard. He furrowed his eyebrows when he noticed that the sun was already out and felt a sensation like a rock had just been dropped in his stomach. Surely, someone would realise by now that he was gone and all Hell would be breaking loose in HQ. He was going to be in some very, very big trouble.

The woman stopped at a particular grave and began to do some maintenance: pulling weeds, brushing away snow and removing the old, dead bouquet and replacing it with the new one. She sat down on the grave, right in front of the gravestone. Allen approached her while keeping an eye on the two akuma watching them through the fence. The woman turned to look at him. She was quite young and Allen could now see that she certainly couldn't be his mother; she looked too young to be the mother of anyone around his age. She gawked at him for a moment before checking herself and clearing her throat.

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to stare," she said. "I've never seen anyone visit this graveyard aside from me."

"Oh, there's no need to apologise," Allen replied. "I'm not from around here anyway."

"Do you have family at this graveyard? Or friends?"

"Neither that I know of."

She tilted her head to the side. "Then why are you here?"

"I don't really know… I was following you…"

She leaned away from him and he could see her body suddenly become tense. Her eyes went wide. "F-following me? I don't have anything of value on me today, I'm only at church! I-I-I…"

"N-no!" Allen stammered, waving his hands in front of him. "I didn't come here to rob you or molest you or anything! I was just curious because you looked very familiar to me."

"Why?"

"Well… I know someone who looks very similar to you."

She relaxed but she still had that frightened rabbit look in her eyes that made Allen feel slightly guilty. "Who?"

"Someone…"

"Who?" she asked again with a bit more force.

"My mother."

Her jaw dropped. They shared an awkward silence that felt heavy on Allen's shoulders. He didn't know what to say to her at this point, so he just scratched the back of his head and looked away.

"That… that can't be… would that mean that you're…" she turned back to the grave. She stared at it in disbelief for a few seconds and then frowned. "No. It must be a coincidence."

Allen activated his Innocence and dived over the woman, wrapping them both in Crown Clown's cape as several bullets shot through the air, hitting gravestones and walls. They both looked up – Allen with anger and the women with astonishment – and saw two Level I akuma hovering above them. Allen knew that this wouldn't take long. He pushed the woman away as another barrage of bullets was let loose. She rolled behind a statue of an angel and curled up into a ball while bullets smashed through the angel and chipped the podium it stood upon.

"Stay low," Allen ordered. "I'll take care of this."

After all, they were only Level I. Allen darted to the side as they began shooting again and fired at them with Crown Edge. He hit just one akuma, which burst shortly after the impact. The other turned all of its barrels to him and fired. Allen scaled a wall and leapt into the air, grabbing the akuma with Clown Belt and yanking it towards him. He finished it off with Edge End.

He looked around as his Innocence deactivated. That fight hadn't even made him break a sweat but it did leave a lot of destruction in its wake; large bullet holes littered the graveyard and gravestones had been blasted to pieces, as well as the wall he'd scaled that now had a huge hole in it and – to Allen's horror – the dust of corpses. His heart skipped a beat. He fell to his knees and punched the ground, cursing himself. By getting caught up in saving one person he neglected any other possible humans who could have been killed. He stopped and looked up when a gentle hand grasped his shoulder.

"Why are you so down? You saved me."

"But I couldn't save someone else," Allen answered, pointing to the dust inside the building that had been shot through.

"I don't understand. What happened? What are those things?"

"They're called akuma and as an Exorcist it's my job to get rid of them," Allen explained, pointing to the badge on his uniform. "If their bullets hit you, you'll become infected with a virus that quickly turns you into dust."

"Wow, th-that's incredible," she gasped. "But why were they after me?"

"Oh, I don't think they were after you, they were after me. However, they wouldn't hesitate to kill you either. They like murdering people."

"The way you say that…" the woman muttered with a shiver, "you have such a straight face. It's creepy."

Allen chuckled. "Really? Well, I suppose. I've been doing this for so long that I don't really think much about it anymore. They just do what they do and I do what I can."

"But you're so young! You're just a boy!"

Allen rubbed the back of his neck. "Yeah, I am. But I need to do this. Those akuma would stop at nothing to destroy all humanity on the Earth."

"My goodness, putting such a big responsibility on such small shoulders…" The woman clasped her hands in front of her chest.

"I'm not that small!" Allen protested.

"My God alleviate your burden."

Allen sighed, deciding not to mention that it was partly God's fault that he had to carry this burden.

"It's not that big of a deal, really," Allen said. "I want to do this. I love this world and everything and everyone in it. I don't mind shouldering this burden or a hundred others like it if it means that I can save this world."

The woman smiled, putting both hands over her heart. "Such a thoughtful boy. Maybe… maybe you could have been my sister's child."

"You sister? Was she Jennifer Morrow?" Allen asked, although he could already guess the answer. Truth be told, he was waiting for disappointment. Nothing ever really turned out right for him so he only ever expected that whatever he thought was going to be completely contradicted.

"No. Her name was Edith Thatcher."

Allen didn't deflate. He'd expected that.

"We didn't keep very good contact since she travelled a lot. She was in the circus, you see. It was the only job she could get in her condition."

"I know how that feels," Allen said with a nod.

"Sometimes she would take a long time, sometimes news would come soon but at one stage she told me that she was about to have a baby. I was so happy about becoming an aunt and hoped that maybe after she'd given birth she would be able to come home so I could see her child. But she couldn't. And the next thing I knew, she'd died. I don't know why or what from but I'd hoped that they would send her child to me since I was family. But I never got news of the baby; I suppose it was just sent into an orphanage."

"So… what did she do in the circus?" Allen asked. He was curious about that and about what condition could possibly leave the circus as someone's only option for employment.

"Well…" the woman looked away and covered her face as if she was embarrassed to say it out aloud. "She was quite a freak. Every year as she grew older, she became very beautiful but she was gradually turning into a lizard."

"A lizard?" Allen blurted out. "You're the Dragon Lady's sister?"

"D-Dragon Lady?"

"I… I wasn't her child," Allen admitted. "But she took care of me as if I was. She was kind."

"Yes, that sounds like Edith."

Allen's stomach suddenly grumbled. He blushed.

"Oh, that's okay," the woman giggled. "Why don't you come to my house and I'll cook you some breakfast. It looked like you'd been here a while."

Allen shook his head. "No, no, you look like you can't afford much and I don't want to eat you out of house and home. Trust me, I have a really big appetite. But thank-you for the offer. And it was nice meeting you. Goodbye."

Allen easily climbed over the fence and ran off in search of a restaurant. He definitely didn't want to return to HQ knowing how much trouble he was going to be in. So he decided to put off his return for as long as he could.

* * *

**Just so you all know**, the next chapter - **Chapter 9** - is going to be the **LAST CHAPTER**. That's right, when you next read this story, it will be over. To be honest, I was thinking that it would go on for a bit longer than it did but it wouldn't go anywhere fast and rather than waste time while thinking of something with which to extend the plot I decided to end it soon and not descend into filler. The next update should be fairly soon too because I have a holiday at the moment and this will give me time to write something quickly.

Glossary:

_"Hail Mary..."_ - different churches and different sects of Christianity have different versions of this prayer, which is a tribute to Mary of Nazareth, Jesus' mother. The only reason why I used the version I used here was because this was the one that was taught to me in my Catholic primary school days.


	9. Answers?

**Answers?**

It turns out that not many restaurants were open during the morning. Allen believed that he must have travelled for miles just to find a place to eat and eagerly sat down at the first dining establishment he found. He naturally ordered pretty much everything on the menu and told the waiter to put the bill on the Vatican's tab since he didn't have any money on him. The restaurant cleared quite quickly when the spectacle of Allen devouring his enormous meal began. And no one was even sure what to make of the little golden-winged thing that was gnawing on the scraps.

Allen wiped his mouth politely afterwards, although it probably wouldn't have mattered at all what he did because the only other group left in the restaurant were looking green in the face. It was a small family with one small child between the two parents. Allen turned his left eye to them and discretely picked up a small pile of four plates. The child opened his mouth and fired the gun that poked out. Allen chucked the plates to intercept the bullet, giving him the space to dodge. The shot shocked the staff who were still on duty. Allen ducked under his table and kicked it over to block the next barrage of bullets that came as the Level II akuma revealed itself. He activated his Innocence and made a dash for the kitchens as the table and the dishes behind him crumbled. The akuma was on his trail with the two parents following, allowing their Level III forms to be revealed.

Allen burst through the kitchen doors and grabbed his Sword of Exorcism and sliced through the kitchen hand. His body seemed to turn inside out, showing his true Level I akuma form before it exploded with a great cross of light. Allen leaped onto the large bench in the middle of the kitchen, intending to slide straight through the middle to the service door at the end. The sou chef – working at the end of the bench – split almost right perfectly in half while another Level III akuma with knives all over its body appeared, seeming to rise out of his mouth. It reached across the bench to cut Allen in half but Allen slashed its arm off before any damage could be done. He made it safely to the end of the bench. He threw the service door open and charged out into the back alley, noting briefly that it hadn't taken long for the weather to turn sour. The various akuma following him smashed down the door. Allen turned to face them: a chicken-like Level II with front-facing guns, a Level III with four arms and no legs, another Level III with strange mucus thickly coating its body and the one he'd just met in the kitchen. It was a lot but Allen believed he could take them.

The Level II akuma opened fire. Allen blocked the bullets as he charged in, aiming to take the Level II out first. The Level III covered in knives got in between when Allen slashed and blocked but that only resulted in it losing its other arm. Allen lifted his sword to slash down on it, which would end its life for good. The akuma lunged forward to deal a last ditch blow with other knives on its chest. It managed to get close and nicked Allen's body in several places – arms, legs, abdomen – while Allen cleaved through its body. He didn't notice the slime-covered akuma working the thick mucus it secreted into a thread. It threw one end of the thread at Allen, catching him on the elbow. Allen paused.

"Don't bother trying to escape this slime," the akuma laughed at him. "It's futile!"

Allen clenched his teeth and took a leap backwards, finding that the mucus was stretchable. He smirked, swinging down to cut the mucus thread. The akuma grinned menacingly.

"Fool! Don't you know happens when my slime isn't connected to my body?"

Allen's eyes widened. He stared at the mucus covering his entire elbow. It became darker as it hardened to the consistency of marble. The legless akuma bounded forward with one arm ready for a punch. Allen stepped backwards and ducked under the hit. The other Level III started to cough deliberately, bringing phlegm up to its mouth. It hurled the slimy stuff at Allen, covering his feet and most of one leg. Allen tripped over and grimaced, knowing that he was now stuck there as the slime hardened. He looked up with wide eyes as the akuma before him raised two of its arms above its head – fingers clasped – and pounded him into the pavement with an impact so forceful it made Allen's body bounce. The Level II leapt up above him, just for the sick satisfaction of seeing Allen's face as he stared helplessly into the many barrels of its guns. The sky rumbled.

"This is it, Allen Walker. You'll get yours," it snickered. The hammers of its guns all clicked simultaneously. It was ready to fire but hesitated when Allen closed his eyes briefly and then stared back expressionlessly. "The Fourteenth…?"

The sky suddenly split in a brilliant flash of light. An enormous fork of lightning burst forth from the heavens and struck the Level II akuma. Allen came to his senses and his eyes widened again. The Level II akuma above him just disintegrated into little pieces in that blinding flash. The other two akuma stared on in shock. The four-armed Level III quickly realised its chance to do what his friend could not. It poised its fingers, ready to jab them into Allen's abdomen.

"Double Illusion Sword: Eight Flower Mantis!"

Allen turned his head, seeing the akuma that was about to attack him had been assaulted with what appeared to be a flower made of energy. There was a loud BOOM and a shockwave ahead of him. He lifted his head to see beyond his feet. The slime-covered akuma had been crushed under a giant hammer.

"Dammit, Beansprout! You're the last person whose sorry ass I wanted to save."

Allen glared at Kanda as he came into view with a scowl on his face. "You had a choice, moron," he bit back.

"Beansprout! You're alive!" Lavi cheered, skipping over to join the group and get between Allen and Kanda before something started. "Geez, you owe me a helluva lot of favours! They woke me up just to find you."

"You sleep too much anyway," Kanda growled.

"Aw, don't be mean, Yuu," Lavi pouted and ducked under Kanda's swift slash. "Anyway, we should probably work on getting Allen out of this muck. I'm sure this'll do the trick…" Lavi examined the hardened slime around Allen's feet and adjusted his hammer to an appropriate size. To Allen it did not look like an appropriate size since its diameter was wide enough to cover his legs.

"Lavi! Don't you dare!" Allen screamed. Lavi happily ignored him and brought the hammer down. The slime cracked a bit but didn't break.

"See, it's working."

"Lavi, how could you?" Allen cried. "What if it had broken and you ended up crushing my feet?"

"Yeah, that would be a bummer," Lavi said casually, shrinking his hammer down to a safer size. "Although the inspector would probably love it since you wouldn't be able to go anywhere and he'd be able to keep an eye on you at all times and not barge into my room and order me to find you."

Allen sighed. "I'm in trouble, aren't I?"

"Yep!"

"Of course you are," Kanda snapped. "You're so stupid, you damn Beansprout. What the hell were you thinking? What is so important that you have to disobey simple orders and waste our time?"

"I was just looking for my mother…" Allen replied.

Lavi and Kanda exchanged glances. A long and pregnant pause followed.

"You're stupider than stupid," Kanda muttered. "There's no word for what you are."

Lavi broke through the slime and helped Allen to his feet. Allen deactivated his Innocence. "Now for your elbow!" Lavi said.

"Um… I'll wait until we get back to HQ," Allen refused.

"Good idea! Let a professional like Komui handle this sort of thing," Lavi beamed, grabbing Allen by his stiff arm and leading him away.

"NO! No! You can do it, Lavi! You can get it off me!" Allen protested.

Lavi shook his head. "I prefer your idea."

"Are you sure it's favours you want back from me or revenge?"

"Same-diff, right?"

Kanda sniggered. Allen turned to glower at him. "This isn't funny, Bakanda!"

"Speak for yourself, Beansprout."

"My name is Allen!" Allen snarled. He decided to let it go with Kanda for now even though it looked like Kanda was willing to milk this for all it was worth for a while. He turned his attention to a window. Two reflections stared back at him as he passed it.

"_Is that why you chose me?"_ Allen wondered in his mind. _"Because I'm a chosen Exorcist with Innocence bestowed upon me by God himself? Surely, it hurts you, doesn't it? The Noah and the Innocence are destined to kill each other. So why do you want it?"_

"Oh, by the way, did you find your mum?" Lavi asked.

Allen thought before answering. There was nothing to be said after everything was done. He hadn't quite found the answer that he wanted but he had the answer that he needed, as dull as it sounded.

"Yeah… it turns out she's quite dead," Allen joked.

"Oooh, sorry to hear that, man," Lavi replied but he sounded as though he already knew.

"Pfft, well that was pretty useless then," Kanda scoffed, genuinely ignorant of the insensitivity of his words.

"Shut up before I turn around and kill you BaKanda," Allen muttered.

"Go ahead and try."

"C'mon, guys," Lavi interjected. "Let's all try to be friends… at least until there's someone else to take care of you."

Allen and Kanda turned to their dark, menacing glares towards Lavi, who looked away and tried to pretend that they weren't directing those at him. Needless to say, the journey back to Headquarters was marked by sporadic outbursts of violence and a lot of teasing and glaring. Despite the fighting and the trouble he knew he was in, as soon as Allen caught his first glimpse of HQ he smiled brightly because he knew that no matter what happened – what was done, what was said or what he felt – he'd always be happy to return.

xxxxxxxx

"We're ba~ack!" Lavi sang, as he threw open the front door. He blanched and ducked under an incoming blow that wasn't meant for him anyway. Allen cringed when he felt the sting of a swift, sharp slap across his face that was quickly absolved by a warm, gentle hug.

"L-Lenalee," Allen stammered.

"Don't ever do something like that again!" Lenalee screeched, clutching the material of Allen's coat and holding him at arm length.

Allen stared into her eyes, seeing the wavering of worry and fear in them and the shine of unformed tears. "I… I'm sorry."

"I was so worried," she cried. "I thought you might have run away for some reason."

Allen hugged her around the shoulders and petted her head with his left hand since his right arm couldn't do much. "It's alright, Lenalee. I didn't mean to go forever. It wasn't you or anyone else who made me want to go, there was just something that I wanted to find out on my own. Everything's fine now."

"Nope, not fine," Lavi squeaked.

Two sets of heavy footsteps resounded through the entrance hall. Allen cringed when he looked away from Lenalee and saw the furious face of Malcolm C. Lvellie and the stoic face of Link. Kanda clicked his tongue and made his leave, sensing trouble. Lavi also began to sidestep away from Allen, ready to make a sneaky getaway. Allen and Lenalee stepped away from each other and stood straight. The inspectors stopped a few feet away, Lvellie looking sour.

"Everyone stay where you are!" Lvellie ordered, catching Lavi and Kanda out. "Allen Walker. My office. Now."

"I'm sorry," Allen apologised, looking down.

"Your apology means nothing to me!" Lvellie snapped. "And you two!" he addressed Lavi and Kanda. "I thought I gave you the order to kill Walker when you found him."

"O-oh, did you?" Lavi asked, attempting to take another sneaky step.

"I said don't move. You'll be punished for your deliberate failure to follow orders. Return to your personal rooms and await further instructions."

Lavi yelped and scampered away. Kanda tried not to show his anxiousness but his pace was much quicker than usual.

"In the meantime, Mr. Walker…"

Allen gulped.

"Wait, inspector," Lenalee interrupted. "We can explain this. Allen didn't mean any harm-"

"He used the Arc without permission. He is in direct violation of the guidelines I set down. How do you know that it was Allen who activated the Ark and not The Fourteenth?"

"But… please…!" Lenalee stuttered.

"Don't worry, it's okay," Allen whispered. He turned to Lenalee and gave her a smile. "I know I'll be alright. I'm sure Lvellie wanted me to come back alive this time, otherwise he wouldn't have sent those two."

Lenalee sighed but she wasn't put at ease, especially not when Allen began to walk away and follow the inspector with Link bringing up the rear.

xxxxxxxx

In Lvellie's office Allen was roughly forced to sit in a straight-backed chair and sealed into it with magic seals, distinctive of the magic of CROW. The door was dead-bolted and Link stood guard directly in front of it, though Allen guessed that there were more guards on the other side. Lvellie took a seat at his desk and clasped his fingers.

"You have betrayed the trust of The Order, boy," he snapped. "For that, you'll be further confined and monitored until further notice."

The flutter of papers reached Allen's ear and he turned in despair to watch his left arm be covered completely with paper seals.

"This is stupid!" Allen argued. "I won't be able to fight akuma…!"

"Your ability to use your Innocence will be at the whim of Howard Link. But don't worry, I've planned to have your participation in missions stripped as much as possible. Even though we are understaffed and the situation only becomes increasingly direr with each passing day, I will not take any risks with the Noah, especially not The Fourteenth."

"I don't think The Fourteenth wants to join the rest of the Noah as they are," Allen replied.

"Explain."

"It wasn't The Fourteenth who escaped last night, it was just me. But since I'm already in trouble, I won't lie. I was searching for something and I met with some of the Noah while I was searching, including a new guy I haven't seen before."

Lvellie's face turned even more sour, if that was even possible. He looked torn between being completely furious or curious about the new information.

"If The Fourteenth wanted to go with them, I would have felt it then. The guy I met – Wisely – is a psychic. If you let him get in your mind you're at his mercy," Allen explained. He looked at his left arm. "Lvellie, whether you trust me or not, you will need my left arm if you want this war with the Noah to end. Everyone in the world is relying on me to use this Innocence to save them, even the akuma. So you've got to release me."

"I said until further notice! I will decide if you can earn enough trust from us again to be fully responsible for your own weapon!" Lvellie shouted. "Link was reporting to me last night about some suspicious activities you were engaging in prior to your escape. Are you willing to shed any light on that?"

Allen smirked. The extent to which he was mistrusted by The Order was almost amusing. For Allen, that information only did little good and he was sure it would do Lvellie even less.

"I just wanted to find out if my mother was really a saint, that's all. Her name is Jennifer Morrow. The moment before she died she gave me away to a Dragon Lady to be reared in a circus freak show but with all the love I could ever need."

"Heresy!"

"It's the truth."

"Very well. Link, set Allen up in a cell."

"Until when?" Link asked.

"Until I say he can come out!"

"Yes, sir," Link saluted.

The seals fluttered and Allen was allowed to get up from the chair. Link showed him to the door and led from behind, keeping a keen eye on the cursed boy. Allen kept his chin up, reaching over as best he could to touch his left arm still covered in seals and feeling the electric tingle of magic running through them.

"Keep walking…" he told himself in a whisper. "Just keep walking."

* * *

"_And even if I die or disappear, I'll do what I can. Because somehow, I have to save everyone."_

* * *

**End.**

* * *

**And that's all**. Yeah, that was a pretty quick update. I told you I had time during this here holiday - 2 days to cover about 1800 words and finish this story for good.

Now this is the only time that I'm going to explicitly ask for **reviews** from people since this is the part where they all count and are most meaningful - at the end of the story. I want to know your thoughts, opinions, comments, questions and critique. If you liked it or if you didn't, or if you kinda liked it enough to keep reading but not enough to enjoy yourself I'd like to know why (Although I'm hoping that everyone did enjoy it).

This has been fun. I look forward to reading everyone's review of this story.

**EDIT:** I ammended the ending so that it's now not as abrupt as it was before. It feels better to me now.

=D_  
_


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